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Monday, 27 June 2016

Maria Merian's Butterflies & Flowers by Janie Hampton

I have always loved detailed, exotic flower designs such as William Morris's 'Pomegranate' wallpaper and Osborne & Little curtains. But until I visited the Queen's Gallery recently, I had no idea that they were all inspired by an extraordinary 17th century woman.

Maria Sibylla Merian was born in Frankfurt in 1647. Her father was Matthäus Merian, a successful printmaker and when he died only three years later, her mother married the still-life artist Jacob Marrel, who taught Merian to paint accurate and detailed flowers.

Pineapple with Cockroaches which Merian described as

‘the most infamous of all insects in America’.

While raising a family, teaching and painting, she also published books of flower engravings, as reference for embroidery and amateur painters.

From childhood, she was also fascinated by the life-cycles and habitats of insects. Merian's full colour compositions were not only elegant but also carefully observed and naturalistic. The caterpillars, chrysalis and adult butterflies are shown on the actual plants on which they fed. Most naturalists then still believed that caterpillars and butterflies were distinct species and Merian was one of the first to understand the metamorphosis of insects. Her pioneering work on the relationship between animals, plants and their environment, and that specific food was vital to the survival of each species, made her the first 'ecologist'.

After separating from her husband, Merian moved with her two daughters to a Labadist commune in Waltha castle in Holland. Choosing to live in simple austerity, she continued her studies including into the metamorphosis of frogs. When the commune broke up, she moved to Amsterdam, then a thriving centre of art and nature, and saw her first pineapple.

Merian was also fascinated by the specimens of exotic insects that were arriving into Europe from South America. But as they were dead, she could not observe their life-cycles. In 1699, she sold all her paints, prints and copper plates, and set off with her 21-year old daughter, Dorothea for Suriname. A Dutch colony in South America, it had been called 'Willoughbyland' until 1667, when the British exchanged it for some swampy islands further North, now called New York.

Maria Merian lived in the capital, Paramaribo, with Dorothea and explored the surrounding forests for plants and animals to draw, and caterpillars to rear and observe. For two years she painted scientifically accurate illustrations, until her ill-health forced them to return home.

Banana
(Musa
paradisiaca)
and bullseye moth (Automeris
liberia).
Merian commented that a banana ‘has a pleasant flavour like apples
in Holland; it is good both cooked and raw.’

Back in in Amsterdam, in 1705 Merian published a luxury book of beautiful, hand-coloured etchings called 'The Metamorphosis of the Insects of Suriname'. She also produced partially printed and hand-drawn coloured plates printed on vellum to sell to her richer patrons. Merian, probably assisted by her daughters, inked sections of each etched plate and ran them through the press. While the ink was still wet, she transferred a reverse image onto a sheet of vellum. This ‘counterproof’ was then coloured by hand with watercolour mixed with gum arabic. Merian varied the arrangement of insects and plants so that each plate is a unique composition. She became one of the most celebrated natural scientists of her age and regarded throughout Europe as both an entomologist and an artist. She was also an astute businesswoman. ‘I had the plates engraved by the most renowned masters, and used the best paper in order to please both the connoisseurs of art and the amateur naturalists interested in insects and plants,’ she wrote.

Guava
tree (Psidium
guineense)
with Army Ants (Eciton sp.),
Pink-Toed Tarantulas (Avicularia
avicularia),
Hunstman Spiders (Heteropoda
venatoria)
and a Ruby-Topaz Hummingbird (Chrysolampis
mosquitus).
Merian showed a tarantula carrying off
a hummingbird which may have led to the erroneous belief that
tarantulas eat birds.

Merian died in Amsterdam in 1717. Three hundred years later her meticulous, brilliant works continues to inspire and excite artists and designers. Several plants, butterflies and beetles have been named after her, such as the Split-Banded Owlet Butterfly (Osiphanes cassina merianae).

False
Coral Snake and Banded Cat-Eyed Snake with unidentified
frogs. Merian shipped snakes from Suriname, preserved in
brandy. This drawing may be by one of her daughters, Johanna or
Dorothea who were also talented artists. Dorothea
worked for Peter the Great in St Petersburg and left her mother's
sketch books with the Russian Academy of Sciences.

In 1810 George III bought the set of plates from Merian's Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium which are now in theRoyal Collectionin London.

3 comments:

Best flower shop in the city! Their 'ready to go' floral arrangements are the best deal in town - and last well over a week. Plus, they always seem ready for BloomThat Flower Delivery - so great to pick them up on way home from dinner.

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